


A Cruel Duet

by AliceinHyruleBastion



Category: Persona 5
Genre: Reincarnation, can be interpreted in any fashion like it can be shippy if ya want, character/dynamic study, i just like pain, this was a midnight ramble I dunno
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-06-09
Updated: 2017-06-09
Packaged: 2018-11-12 02:18:02
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 518
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11152131
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AliceinHyruleBastion/pseuds/AliceinHyruleBastion
Summary: A study in opposites, a thread of fate in a barbed noose-they can't escape the other no matter how far they run.No matter how much blood may spill.





	A Cruel Duet

**Author's Note:**

> I...  
> I don't know what this is man just take it.  
> Enjoy??
> 
> Comments and critiques are always appreciated!

They are a study in opposites:

Black. White.

Good. Evil. 

Right. Wrong.

Death. Life. 

 

But... life- fate, _humanity-_ is not as clear-cut as that. 

It isn't neat.

It isn't pretty. 

 

No, what they are is this:

A heart of good intent, of purity with the seed of giddy and coquettish chaos deep within it, staining it most deliciously salacious crimson; a heart long broken since childhood, its jagged edges festered into an incurable illness of a lost hope, of light turned into pure sour _black_  until the mind has been steeped in it, but within it lies the naïvety and wish of a child cradled within the soft white wings of a whisper, its light locked behind bars of backwards rage.

 

They are the perfect reflections of each other but are also _not,_ because reality has become so twisted by desire and falsity that reflections of yourself are more ripples (cracks) within a pond where decisions lead to other outcomes, other selves, other souls that die with the birth of the next you. 

 

These Tricksters locked in an endless cycle of pain, bound by the throat in red thread, each step closer unraveling their tongues. 

They both walk the tightrope of insatiable loneliness, though while one has cast himself into the darkest pits of hell against the wish of his starving heart, the other clawed to the surface to find hands reaching for him, pulling him close- his unintended salvation. 

(The same monster living within their ribcage-prisons, yet they spill through their skin in different shades of the path they set themselves upon.)

 

In this reality- the one they had saved-  Loki was thought to have perished on the broken wings of a crow, and did- 

The sounds of a gunshot an echo long-lodged in the minds of the rest, invisible stains of blood painting the floor they couldn't see forever dripping from their memories, a final promise stuck to their Joker's tongue like a pin through the body of a moth. 

 

He'd been cruel. He'd been manipulative. Villainous, bloodthirsty, psychotic, deranged, and _ecstatic-_

But he'd also been broken by his own hand. 

He'd been pitied. He'd been welcomed. Naïve, tired, helpless, weak, and oh-so _human_.

 

The true justice lies within Dante's Hell; who are we to truly judge? 

 

They'd been rid of him, yes, but only in this reality, for those two were shattered liked echoes upon the earth, drawn to each other in a destructive entropy to rid the other from the world. 

Cyclical. Cyclical. Cyclical. 

(A voice that won't leave the mind like a song that _just won't die.)_

 

Years came, years went, and this world was a Trickster too heavy. 

Then....

 

Fifteen years later with the sound of gunshot stained in promise still ringing in his ears, a body slams into his own, and he meets eyes of brilliant red- like a scavenger, like the _dead-_ and the circle comes back around with a single half-uttered word: 

"Joker?” 

(Its syllables are dyed sickeningly black and red and purple like an fresh bruise) 

 

The Joker's heart stops cold. 

 

(Fate does love its balance after all.)


End file.
